


Pepper Potts and the Promotion

by Selenay



Series: Dangerous Instruments [3]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Edwardian Period, F/M, First Meetings, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-25
Updated: 2014-05-25
Packaged: 2018-01-26 13:00:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1689188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Selenay/pseuds/Selenay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>"Dummy, what have I told you about--" he broke off as his eyes landed on Pepper. "You're not Dummy."</em>
</p><p>When Pepper met Tony for the first time, he offered her a job. Well, more of a promotion.</p><p>(A prequel to The Clockwork Murders)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pepper Potts and the Promotion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [InexplicableSatsuma (AnnaLibertas)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnaLibertas/gifts).



> A Clockwork Murders reader (AnnaLibertas) asked me how Tony and Pepper met in that universe. I started to type out a comment...and then the idea blossomed into an actual fic.

_London, July 10th, 1900_

Breakfast was a noisy, chaotic affair at Mrs Abingdon's Boarding House for Working Women, which always made Pepper feel slightly homesick for the quiet little house she'd grown up in. Sitting down with toast and tea--bacon and eggs on special days--and quietly reading had been such a peaceful way to start the day. Her father had always glared over his newspaper at anyone who dared to try for a conversation. Pepper's younger brother had been on the receiving end of many glares over the years.

Pepper and her mother had exchanged glances and small smiles each time, while Tim squirmed uncomfortably in his chair before deciding not to risk Mr Potts' wrath any further.

There was always plenty of food at the boarding house, but there were twelve women living there and they were all expected to eat at the long, communal table at the same time. Anyone who was half an hour late--or half an hour early, as Pepper often was when she had a busy day planned--would miss out entirely. Mrs Abingdon was severe about tardiness for breakfast and dinner.

There was a letter under Pepper's plate when she sat down. It was postmarked from Hampshire, but the directions were written in Phil's familiar hand. She frowned down at it. He was supposed to be with his regiment in Africa.

"Ooh, Pepper has a letter!" Nora Ames crowed. 

She leaned forward, almost looking as though she was going to reach across the table to snatch the envelope away. It wouldn't have been an unusual occurrence. More than a few letters had been read aloud at the breakfast table in Nora's nasally voice, when their recipient hadn't been quick enough hiding them.

Pepper was grateful that Nora wasn't sitting next to her, because the other woman would probably have tried to wrest her letter away from her. Mrs Abingdon's glare forced Norma back into her seat, though, to Pepper's relief.

"Is it from Mr Coulson?" Charlotte asked. Pepper's breakfast neighbour smiled prettily and nodded down at the letter. "Are you sure he's not your beau?"

Pepper winced. Charlotte read too many cheap romances.

Thankfully, Bridget O'Connell knocked over the milk jug at that moment, and everyone had forgotten Pepper's letter by the time the mess was cleaned up. She tucked it into a pocket and snatched two slices of toast as the rack went by. Charlotte passed her the apricot jam without a word, and Pepper repaid her with the sugar bowl. Conversation flowed around the table, loud and raucous, and Pepper listened to snatches of it without really taking much in. She finished her tea and toast before most of the women were more than half way through their bowls of porridge, and pushed back her chair to stand up.

"A bit eager this morning, are we?" Nora said, in a syrupy sweet tone. "I can't imagine what you have to rush for."

Pepper gritted her teeth and pasted on a smile she hoped hid her irritation. "Some of us occasionally step up when we're asked to take on extra duties."

Nora snickered. "You know Mr James is married, don't you? Taking on extra duties won't get you a ring."

"Not all of us came to London looking for a husband," Pepper said. "Some of us were looking for a satisfying career."

Mrs Abingdon's lips tightened. "You know I don't tolerate any of that suffragist talk here."

Pepper smiled politely. "That wasn't my intention."

"No," Nora said, her eyes narrowing thoughtfully. "Miss Potts isn't a suffragist. She's ambitious."

She pronounced the word as if it was something vile and disgusting. Several of the women on Nora's side of the table nodded and glared at Pepper. She curled her fingers around the back of her chair and tightened them until they hurt, so she didn't give into the urge to say something unfortunate. As much as she disliked Nora and her friends, Mrs Abingdon's was a good, reputable boarding house and she didn't want to be forced to leave.

Charlotte gave her a small, sympathetic smile, which eased some of the frustration building in Pepper's chest. At least there was someone here who wasn't on Nora's side, even if Charlotte was also only playing at secretary until she could bring someone to the altar.

"If I'm ambitious," Pepper said carefully, "it's only because I would like my work to stimulate my mind for a while before I have to take up a more domestic life. That's not a crime, is it?"

"It's unnatural," Nora declared.

Pepper nodded curtly. "We'll have to agree to differ, then. Good morning."

Before Nora--or Mrs Abingdon--could say anything about her tone, Pepper turned and left. If only the boarding house were filled with more interesting women, she wouldn't spend so much time grinding her teeth and biting her tongue.

***

The morning was bright and warm already, which was pleasant when Pepper walked from the omnibus stop to the office, but promised to be stifling later. The stack of ledgers she needed to check was already sitting on her desk when she arrived. Several bundles of paper had been piled next to it, each addressed in Mr James' messy hand. Pepper frowned as she decoded them, placing each address on a mental map of London.

It would take hours to deliver everything after she'd checked and corrected the ledgers that went with the bundles.

Pepper settled down and opened the first account book to start her work. The office slowly woke up as clerks and typists and arrived. Someone deposited a mug of tea on Pepper's desk at some stage, which she drank without looking up from the long columns of numbers. She was so absorbed, she didn't hear Nora's snide grumbling, or the dressing down Nora was given when the typing supervisor overheard her.

Nor did Pepper see the envious glances Nora shot her way when she stood up to leave. She probably would have pointed out that lugging that much paper around London wasn't a fun day trip if she had.

It was exactly as hot outside as Pepper anticipated, and she was grateful that the firm was willing to pay for the expense of cabs instead of forcing her down into the Underground railway. Or, worse, onto one of the packed omnibuses that stank equally of sweat and horse dung at this time of year. A few routes ran the new steam omnibuses, but as far as Pepper was concerned, they just replaced the dung stench with smoke smell instead.

After her first call, Pepper understood why Mr James hadn't sent everything out with one of their regular courier boys. She was able to explain a few details and point out where signatures were needed, which the boy wouldn't have been able to do. That thought almost made up for the heat and the ache in her arms from lifting the heavy wicker basket containing the papers in and out of cabs.

By mid-afternoon, when Pepper was making her last call, she was hot, grubby, and painfully aware that her shirtwaist was sticking to her skin under her jacket. She was also parched and her stomach was knotting painfully due to hunger. She jumped down from the cab unaided anyway, and hauled out her basket of papers. The driver waited just long enough to take her money before flicking his whip over the horse's back. He drove away much too fast, kicking up a cloud of dust that coated Pepper thoroughly.

She brushed futilely at her skirts for a moment before giving it up as a bad job. Whoever answered the door of the impressive Pall Mall house would just have to trust her not to steal the silver, even though she probably looked scruffy enough to be suspicious.

Pepper drew herself up, trying to project confidence and authority when the butler looked down his nose at her. "Miss Potts from Mr Stark's London office. I have some papers for him to sign."

The butler peered at her for a moment before standing back. His expression didn't soften, not exactly, but he offered to carry her basket when he led her through the house to Mr Stark. Pepper didn't object because the basket was heavy and she was exhausted.

He led her to a room that she thought might have been a library once. It had the shelves from one, certainly, and one of the bay windows still held a window seat filled with pillows, but it had been turned into a workshop of some kind. The shelves were filled with gadgets and boxes of small parts. A heavily scarred workbench ran down the centre of the room and in one corner there was a huge metal...thing...that looked barely half-finished.

The lower half of a man protruded from the base of the machine. Pepper hoped the rest of him was underneath.

"Half inch wrench!" a voice shouted from inside the machine.

A pile of parts that Pepper had assumed were junk suddenly moved, and she jumped. With some quiet hisses of steam and several soft whirs, the mishmash of bits resolved into a brass arm on a base. It trundled over to a low table where a number of spanners had been laid out, and there it almost seemed to tilt its hand thoughtfully.

Pepper was fairly sure it couldn't be thinking. It was a mechanical; they didn't think.

The arm whirred softly a couple of times and wavered indecisively between two spanners. Pepper waited, but it seemed to be stuck.

"Wrench!" the mysterious voice from the machine shouted again. "Dummy, I swear to god, if I have to come out there again this whole damn thing is going to blow up because I'm holding it together with my own hands. Right now, that's what I'm doing. Holding this thing together. Keeping us both from kabooming in a painful, messy way. Don't make me come out there, really, don't."

The arm--Dummy, Pepper guessed--whirred unhappily again, but didn't pick up a spanner. Pepper watched it for a moment longer, but she could see the feet under the machine starting to twitch impatiently. At any moment, their owner might decide to stop holding his machine together with his own hands and then...she didn't want to think about what would happen then.

So she stepped forward, picked up the correct spanner, and fed it through the gap the body was lying in. A hand grasped the tool and she stepped back quickly.

A minute later, there was a loud whoop of triumph and the man began squirming out of his machine.

"Dummy, what have I told you about--" he broke off as his eyes landed on Pepper. "You're not Dummy."

He was wearing a ratty white shirt that was almost as stained with grease as his skin. There seemed to be oil in his hair as well and Pepper thought the red mark on his wrist might be a small burn. Despite the dirt and the ragged appearance, she recognised his face. It was hard not to, when a portrait of it had been hanging on the wall opposite her desk for the two years she'd worked at Stark Industries.

Pepper smiled pleasantly. "Miss Potts, from your London office. Mr James sent me with some papers to sign."

"You passed me the wrench?"

"You mechanical appeared confused."

Mr Stark raised his eyebrows at Dummy. The arm drooped as though it knew it was being chastised. "He's probably got dust in his program cylinders again."

"That kind of thing happens a lot here?"

"He almost handed me a two inch wrench yesterday," Mr Stark said. "But he dropped it."

Pepper stifled a giggle. "I had no idea anyone had built a mechanical advanced enough to take voice commands."

"Nobody has, yet. I asked for a flat-headed screwdriver."

Dummy's arm drooped lower still and landed on the collection of tools, sending half of them rolling across the table. Mr Stark sighed and threw the rag he'd been cleaning his fingers on over Dummy's claw.

"You said you had some papers for me?" Mr Stark said.

The basket was sitting on the workbench, where Jarvis must have left it before he silently slipped out of the room. Pepper rooted through it for a minute before finding the bundle that had been marked for Mr Stark.

"Put them on the bench, I'll look at them later," Mr Stark said.

Pepper shook her head. "These need to be signed today. Mr James instructed me to wait for them."

"You're really going to wait?"

"I'm really going to wait."

"What was your name again?"

"Miss Potts."

Mr Stark pulled the string off the paper bundle and began looking through them, his eyes flickering back and forth as he scanned them too fast to possibly be reading them. "Your first name, Miss Potts. Your mother can't call you Miss Potts."

Pepper blinked. He couldn't be reading and asking questions, could he? "Virginia. Virginia Potts."

He looked up, eyes dancing with amusement. "Really? That's a terrible name. Horrible. I can't call you that."

Privately, Pepper agreed with his assessment of her name, but she couldn't say that out loud. Instead, she gave him a disapproving look and said, "Then it's a good think you'll be addressing me as Miss Potts, Mr Stark."

"Tony."

"Mr Stark," Pepper said firmly. "Are you going to sign those papers today?"

He turned the last page and shrugged. "I might as well. Have you seen a pen anywhere?"

She fished a pen and ink pot out from under a pile of blueprints and held them out.

Mr Stark cleared a space on the bench and began signing. "You seem very efficient. How fast is your shorthand? Could you keep up with me, or I would I have to spend half my day repeating myself?"

Pepper blinked again. He seemed to move from topic to topic without warning. "I'm sorry?"

"How do you feel about airship travel?"

"I've never had the chance to try it," Pepper said.

"I have to present...something at a conference in Brussels next week." Mr Stark shrugged. "I'll figure it out. I'm supposed to be in Vienna on Friday and Berlin on Monday and I need someone who can keep up, not drop my stuff, and make sure I'm in the right country on the right day. Sometimes I get caught up in my workshop and I need someone to make sure that I don't miss the boring meetings when that happens."

The words weren't making sense yet. Pepper had already seen that he could get so focused on his work that he didn't take in his surroundings completely, but everything else he'd said made no sense. It took her longer than it should to put it all together.

"Are you...offering me a job?" Pepper asked eventually.

"Technically, you already have a job," Mr Stark said with a bright smile. "I'm offering you a promotion into a different job. Come and work for me, Miss Potts. If you hate it, I'll make sure your old job is still here when you leave. Or I'll get you another job, somewhere else, if that's what you want."

Pepper pursed her lips to keep a smile from sneaking up on her. "Would there be a raise associated with this promotion, Mr Stark?"

"Call me Tony."

"I don't think so."

Mr Stark pouted, which looked ridiculous, and Pepper felt her lips twitch against her will.

"There's a raise," Mr Stark said after a beat. "A very significant raise. Very. Travel expenses, accommodation...whatever you need."

"I would have thought a man like you already had a secretary," Pepper said.

"I did. I've had a few." Mr Stark shrugged. "I find myself between secretaries again, with a frankly ridiculous timetable that might require actual time travel to meet, and you seem scarily efficient. You even know your way around a toolkit."

Pepper could feel the anticipation of a new challenge starting to make her heart race. There would be travel, and new ideas, and a significant raise might even enable her to afford a flat of her own instead of living in a boarding house. She tried to calm the butterflies in her stomach and calmly said, "I'm not Mr Wells. I can't build a time machine."

"Yeah, I tried building one last year. Didn't go so well."

"What happened?"

"It blew up. Stuff blows up a lot when I'm working. You should be prepared for that."

"Oh, I should?" Pepper smiled. "I haven't said yes, yet."

"But you're going to."

The smile he directed at her was brilliant, far too bright for the messy workshop they were standing in, and something fluttered in Pepper's gut that had nothing to do with excitement or nerves. She ignored the traitorous instinct and tried to think rationally.

This was a good opportunity. The best she was likely to ever have. There would be money, travel, and stimulating work with a man who was clearly some form of genius. There might even be new people with interesting ideas. Phil had been encouraging her to spread her wings and find something she loved to do since she was old enough to want more than a doll's tea party and a pony for her birthday.

Pepper held out a hand. "Yes, I'll work for you, Mr Stark."

"Tony."

"Mr Stark."

"Can I call you Potts?"

Pepper sent him her most disapproving glare, which had absolutely no effect.

"What do your friends call you?" Mr Stark asked.

"I'll tell you when we're friends," Pepper said with a small smile.


End file.
